14 DAY TRIAL // Nobel laureate Alexander Fleming discovered that tears contain molecules called lysozymes, which act as disinfectants, destroying bacteria that are far larger in size. A group of investigators at the University of California in Irvine (UCI) was recently able to figure out precisely how tears are able to do that.
Harmful bacteria exist on every portion of our skins, as well as inside our bodies. Most of them can be found on the most exposed areas, such as our hands and faces. The average human touches their faces about 3 to 4 times per minute, so the microorganisms get easily transferred there.
Past studies have revealed that tears are able to destroy a significant portion of these pathogens, but researchers never knew the exact process by which this was done. The new UCI study reveals an aspect related to the structure of the lysozymes that experts had no idea about.
Scientists with the study were able to analyze the disease-fighting protein only after they attached it to a very small transistor. This allowed them to determine that lysozymes have jaw-like structures on their surface, which permit them to latch on to the surface of invaders.
Once the molecules are attached, their jaws mercilessly chew their way through countless rows of cellular walls, essentially disemboweling microorganisms many times their size. Additional details of how this is achieved were published in the January 20 in the top journal Science.
“Those jaws chew apart the walls of the bacteria that are trying to get into your eyes and infect them,” explains Gregory Weiss, who holds an appointment as an UCI professor of chemistry, and a molecular biologist. He co-led the project with associate professor of physics & astronomy Philip Collins.
In order to study lysozymes, investigators had to build one of the smallest transistors in the world. The device they came up with (after several years of attempts), is roughly 25 times smaller than similar electronic components found in smartphones and laptops today.
“Our circuits are molecule-sized microphones. It’s just like a stethoscope listening to your heart, except we’re listening to a single molecule of protein,” Collins explains, adding that each lysozyme was individually glued to the tiny transistor during the investigation.
This study holds important implications for early diagnostics techniques aimed at diseases such as cancer. “If we can detect single molecules associated with cancer, then that means we’d be able to detect it very, very early,” Weiss explains.
“That would be very exciting, because we know that if we treat cancer early, it will be much more successful, patients will be cured much faster, and costs will be much less,” he goes on to say.
The National Cancer Institute and the US National Science Foundation (NSF) provided the funds needed for the research effort.